Entrepreneurs are often eager to talk about their startups. Drew Perez, founder of artificial intelligence (AI) startup Adatos, seems like an exception to the rule. As I asked about Adatos, he seemed to steer clear of discussing it.

“Talking about the history of the company – that’s so myopic, right?” he says, preferring to discuss the big picture.

But it’s hard to ignore him and his company. Started three years ago, Adatos is one of the rare AI startups based in Singapore that focuses on agriculture.

Starting an AI company isn’t a typical retirement plan for most, but Perez isn’t typical. His goal is to find the right use case for artificial intelligence within Southeast Asia.

To do that, his team has automated the process of creating machine learning models – essentially an AI that builds its own AI to solve the problems specified by a human. The technology essentially takes on the role of a data analyst.

It was only in their third year that Adatos zoomed into its vertical of choice: agriculture. The startup acquires satellite imagery of farmland and processes them to produce data that can advise farmers on crop management.

Focusing on agriculture helps Adatos address a genuine need in the world — food security. With the world population rising, the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) estimate that the number of people undernourished in the world has been on the rise since 2014, reaching 815 million in 2016. With the population increasing, farmers are struggling to keep up.

Perez thinks data can help. Farmers can use satellite data to evaluate what land to buy, or how to manage their water and fertilizer better. They can help predict potential risks to crops, such as floods or soil fertility decline.

“If we can move the needle 0.0001 percent on getting more yield out of the land, it’s more than any of us could hope for in making an impact in the world, right? It’s a huge difference.”